


Parallels

by dropout_ninja



Category: Original Work
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Cross-Generational Friendship, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Mecha, Monsters, Original Character Death(s), Original work - Freeform, Prompt Challenge, Young Love, ambiguous tragedy, different ways a prompt can be taken, parallel reality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-07 19:31:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17966648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dropout_ninja/pseuds/dropout_ninja
Summary: Two different authors given the same prompt can deliver widely varying stories.- A young boy struggles to discover the name of the monster only he seems to believe he saw.- A knight pushes an old librarian to come out of his shell as he helps her learn about her assigned mecha.





	1. No incapacitation stronger, no fear unconquered

**Author's Note:**

> A friend and I both challenged ourselves to write a short story on a prompt of her choice. Both are over a year old and posted here in separate chapters.
> 
> Prompt: The story is about a distant librarian who is constantly annoying a peaceful paladin. It starts in a parallel universe. A sudden increase in dangerous monsters is a major plot element.  
> Requirement: a character that either 1- is a cinnamon roll 2- looked like a cinnamon roll but could actually kill you, or 3- looked like they could kill you but was actually a cinnamon roll. 
> 
> Both are undoubtedly guilty of cliches but were very fun to work on, if just to compare the different ways we took the requirements.
> 
> This chapter contains the 1st of those stories, the 2nd chapter contains the other.
> 
> AN- Raphael and Winnie are 9-10 years old

Dark shadows played upon the ground as the troop of squire Paladins walked through the forest. Every noise seemed to herald the coming of some hideous monster, but none had appeared so far. The boys in the troop, though quite young, were not disturbed. They were training to be Paladins, and that meant that they had learned to control their fear. As they set up camp that night, a hissing noise reached their ears. The older Paladin who was their guide raised a hand for silence, and listened. The grass swished and swayed.  
“Behind you!” one of the squires cried. The guide turned to see a huge snake, towering up above him, with glowing red eyes and fangs dripping venom. The Paladin drew his longsword, but the serpent disappeared.  
“A harmless Phantom,” the guide Paladin said, “Set up camp.”  
That night, Raphael could hardly sleep for the terror of the Phantom. It had not seemed like one the monsters that was simply trying to scare you, but rather, like one of the more sinister ones. When he arrived at home, late the next night, Raphael pulled out a book on Phantoms. These were monsters that could do you no direct harm, but would hunt you, and try to frighten you and make you hurt yourself on accident. Raphael had heard stories of people who ran from Phantoms, and in their terror, had run off a cliff. Others would run till they dropped dead of exhaustion.  
There were several Phantoms that took the form of serpents, but none were quite like the one he saw. Raphael began to look for an encyclopedia of monsters, but they did not have one. His father, a high ranking Paladin called Uriel, had little interest in books, and so there were few, even on monsters in the house. Realizing that there was only one place where he could go for books, Raphael sighed. The library was one of his least favorite places. The librarians were all stuck up and aloof. They were not so free with their gifts of knowledge and intellect as Paladins were with their strength and bravery. Raphael put his backpack on his back, and walked down the street to the huge stone building bearing the inscription, “Scientia sit potentia”. He didn’t know what it meant, but his father always scoffed at it when they passed. As he pushed the door open, a breeze of cool air flowed out, and the smell of dust and old books wafted through the air. It was exceptionally quiet inside. In the Paladin training building there was always voices, laughter, and song. Here there was none.  
“Can I help you with something?” asked a toneless voice. Raphael turned to see a girl about his own age in a wheelchair. Her face held as much expression as her voice did.  
“Yes, please!” Raphael said loudly. Several people glared at him in annoyance. The girl did not seem affected, but only mildly annoyed.  
“What are you looking for?” she asked.  
“Books on snake monsters,” Raphael said, more quietly this time.  
“Follow me,” the girl said, and began to propel herself slowly towards the section labeled monsters. It was obviously hard for her, so Raphael took the handles of her wheelchair and pushed her all the way over.  
“Right here,” she said, pointing to an isle.  
“These are all on snake monsters?” Raphael asked.  
“No, just this section here,” The girl said, then asked in slight amusement, “Have you ever even been in a library before?”  
Raphael shook his head. “I’m a Paladin squire, and we mostly tell stories, not read them, and pass information on by word of mouth.”  
“Oh,” the girl said then asked, “Did you push my chair because of the law that Paladins have to help disabled people?”  
“That's a law?” the young Paladin asked.  
“Yes, it’s part of your code, how do you not know that?”  
“Well, none of us really know the codes, only the Elder Paladins, who are the judges. We have just always been taught to help anyone who needs help.”  
The girl thought about this for a little while, then asked if he needed anything else.  
“Well, I’m trying to find a specific monster, how could I find out what it is?” Raphael asked.  
The girl pulled a heavy book off the shelf. It was called An Exhaustive Inventory of Serpentine Monsters. Raphael wheeled her over to a table where she set the book down and began flipping carefully through it.  
“Did you hear about this monster or see a picture of it?” the girl asked.  
“I saw it myself,” Raphael said.  
“Where?” the girl asked, surprised, and slightly frightened.  
Raphael told her about the entire incident, from start to finish.  
“You are good at telling stories,” she said with complete detachment.  
“Thank you,” Raphael said, “You are good at finding books.”  
“I am a librarian,” she said coolly, “And it is not very hard at all.” she went back to flipping the pages of the book.  
“Well I think it is amazing,” Raphael said. The girl payed him no attention. She was so very aloof for one so young. Why did she not smile and laugh? No, she was too busy being grownup-ish, and it annoyed Raphael.  
“Alright, here are all the Phantom serpents,” she said, “Is it one of these?” As they slowly flipped through the section, Raphael did not see the one from his camping trip. They moved on the the next section, Venomous Serpents, but it was none of those, nor was it a Constrictor. There was only one small section left. The librarian closed the book.  
“If it wasn’t one of those, I don’t know what you saw. I wish I could help more,” she said.  
“What about the last section?” Raphael asked.  
“That is about extinct snake monsters, so it couldn’t be there,” the girl explained.  
“Could we just look?” Raphael pleaded.  
The librarian sighed and opened the book back up. There were some smaller serpents that had died out, but it was none of those. Then they came to the last entry in the book. The title was Wraith Python. The girl shuddered.  
“You shouldn’t look at this picture, it’s really scary,” she said.  
“What if it’s the one I saw?” Raphael asked.  
“You couldn’t have seen this one,” the girl said dismissively.  
Just because she was acting so grown upish, Raphael flipped the page like a naughty child.  
“That's it!” he cried in horror, forgetting to be quiet. The girl shushed him.  
“Are you sure?” she asked condescendingly.  
“Yes!”  
“Absolutely sure?”  
“Completely.”  
“Positive?”  
Raphael looked her in the eye and nodded.  
“This monster is older and more horrible than any other monster in this book. It was expelled from our universe a long time ago, you could not have seen it!” she cried.  
“You don’t believe me?” Raphael asked.  
“I don’t think you are lying,” she said slowly, “But you could not have seen this serpent.”  
“I think I need to go and talk to my father about this,” Raphael said.  
“He won’t believe you either,” the girl said.  
“I have to try to warn someone,” Raphael said, “Anyways, my Paladin guide can back me up. He saw it.”  
“Well, good luck then,” the girl said.  
“Thank you!” said the young paladin, and headed for the door. He stopped short and turned back. He asked, “What is your name?”  
“Winnifred,” she said, “But call me Winnie, what's your name?”  
“I’m Raphael,” he replied, “It was nice meeting you Winnie!”

“Father!” Raphael called as he entered his house, “Father, I’ve got to talk to you!”  
“Your father is busy right now, Raphael,” his mother yelled from the kitchen, “Don’t bother him.”  
“It’s important, Mother!” Raphael insisted, “I really must talk to him.”  
“Paladins all over are disappearing, Your father is is out in council meetings to determine the threat. You cannot bother him right now,” Raphael's mother said sternly, but seeing her son’s disappointment, she handed him a small sweet she had baked, and smiled reassuringly. She shooed him off, saying, “Now run along, I’m sure your father will fix the problem, and you can tell him all about whatever it is later.”  
The problem, however, was not fixed. Uriel came home late, and left early the next morning. His father obviously had too much on his mind to help Raphael with his ancient snake problem. The Paladin squire decided to go back to the library and find his new friend Winnie.  
To his surprise, Winnie was looking at books about the snake monster when he got to the library.  
“I knew you would come,” she said coolly.  
Librarians are so annoying, Raphael thought, Just because they know more than other people doesn’t make them any better. He quickly chided himself for thinking such a thing. Paladins didn’t think mean things about people, and especially not about little girls in wheelchairs. He felt his cheeks begin to burn in shame. When Winnie looked up, he could barely meet her eyes.  
“Is something wrong?” she asked.  
“I had a mean thought,” Raphael said, feeling tears come to his eyes, “Please forgive me.”  
Winnie suddenly laughed. “For a Paladin, you aren’t very tough, are you?” she said.  
“We are taught to always be kind, even in what we think,” Raphael said.  
“I like you,” Winnie said with a smile bigger than any Raphael had seen her wear before.  
“Then we an be friends?” Raphael asked hopefully.  
“I’d like that,” Winnie replied.  
“Forever?”  
Winnie looked suddenly very sad. “Sure,” she said, her smile fading, giving way to the previous absent expression, “But that's not so long.”  
“What do you mean by that?” Raphael asked, alarmed.  
Winnie sighed shakily before answering. “You see this wheelchair? I don’t use it because my legs don’t work, I use it because I am very weak. I am weak because I have a very rare, and very dangerous disease.”  
“And it will take a long time of resting for you to recover, so the doctors want you to use a wheelchair, so you don’t overexert yourself?” Raphael asked. “So you will walk again eventually?”  
“No,” Winnie said, “I won’t walk anymore. I will just get weaker and weaker till I can't even go out in my wheelchair.”  
Raphael was still unable to grasp what his friend was saying. “I don’t understand,” he said, “Why aren’t you getting better?”  
“The doctors can’t cure me,” Winnie said, with a twinge of bitterness in her voice, “I am dying, Raphael. They don’t think I will make it through summer.”  
“No!” The young Paladin cried, “The doctors just have to keep trying, they can find a way if they jut keep trying!”  
“They’ve been trying for years,” Winnie said, “There’s nothing they can do.”  
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Raphael asked, though he felt deep down that there was absolutely nothing.  
“You are already helping,” Winnie said, “just by being my friend. It helps to keep my mind off it.”  
“Then I’ll be your friend,” Raphael said.  
“Forever?”  
“Forever,” whispered Raphael.  
Winnie smiled, and her eyes filled with tears. “Let's keep working on your snake problem,” she said after a moment, and she turned back to the books.  
Together they researched the Python wraith, and learned all sorts of horrifying things about it. It was invisible when it chose to be, it could go through walls, it could even kill you just by breathing on you. The Paladins had been unable to kill it, so they banished it to another dimension. All the worst monsters, the wraiths, had been banished to this dimension and trapped there.  
“You really need to tell your dad about this,” Winnie said, as Raphael was preparing to leave, “He needs to do something about it.”  
“He’s really busy,” Raphael said. “Paladins are mysteriously disappearing, and he’s trying to find out why.”  
Winnie’s eyes went wide. “What if the snake is killing them?” she asked quietly.  
They stared at each other in horror.  
“I’m going to go find my father,” Raphael said quickly, slinging his backpack onto his back.  
“Good luck!” she called.  
Raphael ran as fast as he could down the street to the Paladin headquarters. After spending the last two days in the library, it seemed loud and chaotic. He ran straight to the council room where his father was. He could here shouting from inside, then the door opened quickly, almost hitting him, and two Paladin guards dragged a wildly gesticulating figure out. Raphael could only hear snatches of what he said, but he caught the words “escaped” and “Wraiths.” He stared after the man in wonder. What if he had come to the same conclusion Winnie and he had?  
“Raphael?” His father called from inside, “What are you doing here, child?”  
Raphael walked over to his father, who lifted him effortlessly up onto his knee. Despite being one of the youngest Paladins on the council, his father’s face was creased with worry and fatigue. The others were talking amongst themselves, so Uriel could give his full attention to his little son.  
“Father, On our squire trip,we saw a big monster. Our scout leader thought it was a Phantom, but, I don’t think it was. I looked at a book about snake monsters at the library, and it wasn’t one of the Phantoms.”  
“Did you find out what it was?” Uriel asked. Raphael nodded.  
“I am afraid you will not believe me,” the boy confessed after a moment of silence. Several of the other Paladins looked over.  
“What do you think it was?” Uriel prompted gently.  
“The Wraith Python,” Raphael said softly. There was dead silence from all the council.  
“You have frightened yourself for no reason, my son,” Uriel said gently, “Don’t worry, it is trapped in another world, it cannot come here.”  
“Father, my Guide saw it too, if you show him the picture I saw, he will tell you the same.”  
Uriel sighed deeply, as though pained. “Raphael,” he said slowly, “Your Guide was among those who disappeared. I am so sorry. I meant to tell you last night, but you were already asleep when I got home.”  
Raphael was too shocked to cry for a moment. Sobs began to well up in his throat. His father stroked his hair gently, and held him close.  
“I know how much you loved your guide,” He said, “I am so sorry this has happened. We are going to figure out why everyone is disappearing. Then we will stop it from happening again.”  
A young Paladin woman came and walked him home to his mother, who tried to comfort him as best she could. As he cried himself to sleep that night, Raphael realized that he was not just crying for his Guide, but for Winnie too. She also would die, and he could not protect her.  
The next day, he went to the library again. He told Winnie everything.  
“I guess this is up to us then,” she said, “Over to the history section. We need to know how these things used to be fought.”  
Though they spent the entire day reading through tales of fighting Wraiths, there seemed to be no way to defeat them. They did find out where the portal had been made before, and as it turned out, it was not far from the city. Raphael went home feeling that they had accomplished nothing. It was hard to continue looking when they had found nothing for so long.  
The next day he went again to the library, but Winnie was not there.  
“Excuse me,” he said to another librarian, who looked over the top of her glasses at him, “Do you know where Winnie is?”  
“Winnie? Winifred Wyse?” she asked, her harsh face softening, “She had to go to the hospital. She is not well.”  
Raphael hardly remembered to thank the woman as he rushed out of the library. The hospital was not far. He ran into the main reception area. One of the nurses stood up, concernedly and asked him if something was wrong.  
“I’m looking for my friend Winnie,” he said.  
The woman nodded, and looked in her ledger. “Let’s see,” she said, “A Winifred Wyse came in early this morning, is that your friend?”  
“Yes, can I see her?” Raphael asked.  
“Follow me, we’ll ask her parents,” said the nurse, and led him down the hall. She poked her head into one of the rooms, and spoke to someone inside. Then she opened the door and let him in. Winnie was laying on a hospital bed, and she looked paler than she had before. A man and a woman who looked very much like Winnie were sitting on one side of the bed. They were watching Raphael in curiosity. Winnie tried to sit up, but could not.  
“Thank you for coming,” Winnie said, smiling. Raphael tried to smile back, but he could not for the tears threatening to shed themselves. “Sit down,” Winnie insisted in a surprisingly happy tone, “I know what to do. Now you must stop being sad about me, and do as I say. I will die soon, but I want you to help me fix the big problem before I go.”  
“Of course I will,” Raphael assured her. Her parents were talking to each other in soft voices, and they did not hear what their daughter was saying.  
“The portal is a door,” Winnie continued, “If you break the door as the wraiths are coming through, the portal will close, and the Wraiths will be left in the empty vacuum of space. No portal there can ever be opened again.”  
“But the Wraiths are already here,” Raphael said.  
“I think they are connected to the other world still,” Winnie said. “The book I read said that they have always left our world in the day time. They are only around at night. If you hurry, you can make it by tonight, before they come.”  
“Alright,” Raphael said, “I will try. Then I will come back here.”  
“Goodbye Paladin Raphael,” she said with a smile.  
“Farewell lady Winifred,” Raphael said, in the manner of the Paladins of old, and keeping with the ancient custom, he kissed her hand. She giggled.  
Winnie’s father walked Raphael out of the hospital.  
“Thank you very much for visiting my daughter,” said the man, “I have not seen her so happy since before we knew she was…. was..”  
The man fell silent.  
“I was honored to be her friend,” Raphael said, “I must go, I have something I must do.”  
The man nodded and went back into the hospital.  
Raphael turned and began to walk quickly towards the forest. He walked for a long time on forest paths, feeling very small and alone. Just as the sun was setting behind the mountains, he came to a huge arch of stone in the path. It permeated the scent of magic, and the air tingled. Raphael suddenly realized that he had no idea how to tell when the portal opened, and when the monsters were coming through. Just then, a small blue light appeared in the center of the arch, then grew larger and larger till it was like a mirror, reflecting another world, yet instead of his reflection, he saw Wraiths. They were more terrifying than he have possibly imagined. They entered the portal, and began coming slowly towards him. He attacked the arch with all his might, pushing as hard as he could. The stone did not budge. For the first time, Raphael realized he might fail. He would be just another disappearance, and Winnie would die without seeing the problem fixed. He would fail Winnie.  
Raphael grabbed the stone, and let out a mighty roar of exertion. The Python Wraith was almost out of the portal. Raphael pushed for his guide, for his father, and most of all for Winnie. The stones toppled to the ground. The wraiths let out a horrible scream, and the portal exploded, sending out giant shock waves. Raphael was thrown hard against tree before falling to the ground. He screamed in pain, and his vision went dark for a moment, but soon cleared. A beautiful ethereal figure hovered in front of him. It seemed like a woman, but more beautiful than any he had seen before.  
“My name is Alenira,” she said, “I was the spirit that had been trapped and used to hold the portal open. You have freed me. I am eternally grateful.” Raphael was speechless. Alenira looked concerned, then said, “I feel that you have been badly hurt. Your spine, it is damaged. You will never walk again. However, out of gratitude for being freed, I will heal you.”  
She raised her hand, but Raphael quickly cried, “Wait my lady!” She stopped, slightly annoyed.  
“You would refuse my gift?” she asked scornfully.  
“My lady,” Raphael pleaded, “My friend, Winnie, has a rare and dangerous disease. She is dying. Please, instead of healing me, heal her.”  
Alenira’s face softened. “You have a great heart,” she said, “I see now where you got the strength to destroy the portal. Very well, I will heal your friend.”  
The spirit again raised her hand, and then said, “It is done. Farewell, Paladin,” and she disappeared. Raphael could not feel his legs at all. His head hurt too. Slowly, he slipped out of consciousness wondering what would happen now.

 

Uriel was in a panic. His son Raphael had disappeared the following day, just after leaving the hospital. The Wraiths could not have taken him, because it had been daylight when he had left. Uriel new it was Wraiths causing most of the disappearances. He had not believed the clearly senile old man who had insisted on them being the culprit. Raphael, however, was always regarded as reliable. He spoke with the parents of the girl his son had visited in the hospital, and they could tell him little,except that his son had left to look for something. Uriel’s heart had sunk. The portal. Raphael had gone to find the portal. He was sure to be killed. He gathered a small group of the best warriors, and led them into the forest. It was almost midnight when they made it to the clearing where the arch had been. Uriel gasped in wonder. Only a pile of stones remained. He looked around wildly, and finally saw Raphael’s body lying at the base of a tree. He ran over and pulled the boy into his arms.  
“Father?” Raphael asked sleepily. Uriel could have cried in relief. The boy was alive.  
“Are you alright?” he asked.  
“I closed the portal. The Wraiths are in between worlds. I did it!” he answered softly.  
“You have done more than any other has dared. You are a great hero, my son,” Uriel said, with pride clearly evident in his voice, but then asked, “Are you hurt?”  
Raphael nodded. “There was a spirit,” He said, “I freed her by destroying the portal. She said I wouldn’t walk again, but it offered to heal me. I asked her to heal my friend Winnie instead though, and she did, so Winnie’s going to be okay!”  
“You healed the little girl in the hospital?” Uriel asked, feeling even prouder. Raphael nodded. “Let's go back there so you can tell her,” Uriel said. He picked his son up, and carried him back to the hospital.  
When they arrived, the nurses rushed him away to take care of his wounds, but there was nothing they could do for his spine. The doctors came, and told Uriel and his wife, who had joined him, that their was indeed nothing to be done. The boy would be in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.  
The next morning, Winnie rushed into his room, with two nurses behind her begging her to slow down.  
“Raphael!” she cried, “They said you did it! They said you got rid of the Wraiths forever!”  
“Winnie, you’re going to be okay!” Raphael said excitedly, “I freed a spirit, and she healed you for me! You’re going to be okay!” Winnie stood stock still.  
“I’m not going to die?” she whispered.  
“No, you won’t,” Raphael said, “At least not until you are old.”  
Winnie hugged him and started to cry.  
“Thank you!” she sobbed.  
“There is one thing,” Raphael said, when she had calmed down, “I was hurt when the portal was destroyed. I can’t walk ever again. So, you might have to push me around in a wheelchair now.”  
“Of course I will,” Winnie promised, “Forever.”


	2. A smile worth the world

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A friend and I both challenged ourselves to write a short story on a prompt of her choice. Both are over a year old and posted here in separate chapters.
> 
> Prompt: The story is about a distant librarian who is constantly annoying a peaceful paladin. It starts in a parallel universe. A sudden increase in dangerous monsters is a major plot element.  
> Requirement: a character that either 1- is a cinnamon roll 2- looked like a cinnamon roll but could actually kill you, or 3- looked like they could kill you but was actually a cinnamon roll. 
> 
> Both are undoubtedly guilty of cliches but were very fun to work on, if just to compare the different ways we took the requirements.
> 
> AN- I called it a challenge for a reason. The entire setting and writing style is not normal for me. It’s not a genre/setting I care for. The style is full of time skips and paraphrased conversations, which I also hadn't dabbled in at the time this was written. It is also an inter generational friendship, which I'd never written. And the ending is undoubtedly cliche but most of the effort went into different areas.
> 
> Parallel universe:  
> Terra=Earth  
> Xiao’erjing- Desert  
> A huge desert located where the Gobi desert is in our universe, but stretching further in the pacific ocean and further west into the Taklamakan Desert.  
> Lifespans are about twenty years longer. So 70=50 in health.

A harsh blast of air blew across the courtyard.  The wreckage of a large mech lay broken across the burned tiles of the training ground.  With a few grunts, the mechs’ pilot crawled out of the smoking cockpit.

“Adira!  Are you alright?” a young man ran to the pilot.  The tall young woman waved some smoke out of her face and coughed.

“I‘m fine Jiorna,” she blew some soot off her pale face and grinned, “but I don’t think the Mark 6 is.”

The girl turned her attention to the smoking mech she sat atop.  The Mark 6 was not a new design, but it was a model only recently built by the Wushi Knights.  Adira Zahler was a prodigee paladin and the untested mecha was hers to test. Unfortunately, the newly built mech was almost completely alien to her and lay damaged on the training grounds floor.

“That’s for sure,” the other paladin laughed with her.  Adira looked over the Mark 6. She was completely responsible for the new mecha and that meant she had to determine what was wrong and fix it.

“Well, you’re aware that all these mechs were designed by the men of Thwayya,” Jiorna said, “So you’ll have to go to their Library to find a manuscript on the Mark 6.  In order to fix it, you know.”

Adira groaned.  She did know. The Wushi Knights had no engineers that compared to the old geniuses of Thwayya.  All the Marks were built off of the old designs, the mechanics at Wushi only now deciding to try to use them.  However, the Library at Thwayya was not among Adira’s favorite places in the world. She had been visiting it with her parents since she was young, as it held the most knowledge in the city of Vernda.  And it seemed that since those library trips started, one librarian had taken a particular joy in exasperating her. But however she felt about the staff, Adira had to go to the library and find whatever manuscripts on the Mark 6 she could.

It was a blindingly sunny day in Vernda as the mech pilot travelled into the District of Thwayya.  Despite the light, the temperature was cold. The massive city of Vernda was situated in the Xiao’erjing Desert and was the only human settlement known to be left on Terra.  The city was the size of a country, surrounded by a wall and covered by a ciel tinted dome. Many city sectors were devoted solely for the hydroponic growth of food or the mining of minerals and fuels.  Xiao’erjing was a cold desert and Vernda was cold in most sectors. Thwayya was one of those cold sectors. Being a paladin in the Wushi Knights meant that Adira wore a well insulated uniform that warded the cold off under her piloting suit.  For her journey to the library, the pilot had not even bothered removed her paladin armor.

The Library was an enormous domed building, started centuries ago by a mystic group of librarians and scholars.  Adira walked towards the shadowed entrance. The young woman took a few steps inside the dark interior, trying to remember where the section on newer designations was.  Unfortunately, she could not remember and her ambling about brought her face to face with the librarian Talihah.

To say he was a bit different looking would be an understatement.  The faded blue carapace on his body was visible through the brown robe he wore.  The ribbon like pattern of his ridged skin could also be seen. With the robes hood down, the two gray horns that extended back and out from his head went undisguised.  A bit different was a light way of saying no, the librarian was not human.

The scowl that he always seemed to wear around her, however, was a very human expression.

“Hello Mr. Soen’na,” Adira greeted the man respectfully.

“It’s you,” he responded softly, “What do you need?”

“I need to find books on the Wushi Knights Marks,” she replied.  

“I need more information,” Talihah said, “Which designation do you need?”

Adira fidgetted.  

“The Mark 6,” she answered.  

“Oh?” a ridge above an eye lifted.  An expression picked up, she assumed, by a lifetime around humans.  “Right this way then.”

She followed the man up a set of stairs.  Adira noticed that he glanced down many times at her, but she gave no sign that she’d seen.  His exasperating attitude extended to most that came here, other than a few of the older citizens.  Perhaps the ones who had known him when he was younger. There weren’t many humans old enough to have been around when he was first brought into the city.

After much climbing, they reached yet another quiet section of the library.  Talihah directed the paladin to a table and then began to walk through shelves and pull books down.  When he returned to set them before her and sit down across the table, he broke his silence.

“Why did the Wushi Knights finally decide to build this one?” Talihah asked, “It is a drastically different model and relies on resources that the others Marks do not.”

“The fuel source the Mark 6 uses is in a greater quantity than the fuel for the other mechas,” the paladin answered, “Vernda is running low on nenryo, so that’s one of the reason the Wushi Knights feel we must transfer to the Mark 6 and above models.”

“You people are always in some trouble or other,” he murmured.  

She began “So wer-” _ -e yours _ finished mentally, but Aidra had cut off the sentence.  His orange eyes glared at her as if daring her to finish.  She only opened the top book. 

“Fuel crisis, riots by stir crazy citizen who want out, panic from those afraid of what’s out; and those are only today's problems,” Talihah muttered as she tried to read.

“I‘m glad you’ve noticed our problems,” the paladin said, face still down reading and blonde hair obscuring her expression from view.  

“Oh, those are your problems child, not ‘ours’,” the librarian snorted.  His aloofness to Vernda’s latest struggles annoyed her, but she had been prepared to be annoyed at the library.  And she supposed he was right. Talihah was a Monsuta, not a human, and he was the only Monsuta in a city full of humans.  How he got there, Adira wasn’t sure. From her father’s stories and from history lessons she knew the Monsuta appeared in the desert a century ago.  Unable to communicate with the creatures and more than startled and mystified by their sudden and unexplained presence, disaster struck. Humans fought the unknowns, the unknowns fought the humans.  The Wushi Knights were created to prepare against the alien threat. Thirty years had passed since the last Monsuta sighting and the knights seemed unnecessary. Public opinion certainly thought that they were consuming resources without any reason for existing.  

Even so, his aloof attitude never ceased to aggravate her.  He had spent decades in this city. She’d think that was enough to get attached and start caring.

Adira rented the books after scanning the introduction pictures and headed out.  She had thought that’d be thorough enough. Returning to the library the next day was proof it hadn’t been.

“I can’t read these,” Adira set the books down on a table Talihah was working by.  The old librarian glanced over at her.

“It is an older Thwayyan dialect, I suppose,” he muttered, looking through pages, “The Mark 6 is a unique, but old design.  The Wushi never bothered with translations, I suppose. Alright, sit down,” the man pointed at a chair. She sat, the chairs much more comfortable in the gray sweats she wore today than the hard armor she had worn the previous one.  Across from her, Talihah sat slowly. He pulled a manual towards him and began to translate it for her.

“It amuses me that a human cannot read human manuscripts and must rely on a Monsuta to do so,” Talihah scoffed after a few minutes.

“This library has existed for far over century,” Adira pointed out, “and I have not.”  

The Monsuta was silent, returning to the book.

“And you have been here for nearly a century,” she added, “far before I was even born.”

“I get your point,” Talihah admitted, before focusing once again on the manuscripts.  Adira could’ve left the conversation at that, but the old librarian looked so unfocused that she wished to be an ear for him.

“Just how long have you been here?” the girl pried.  Talihah gazed up.

“About as long as you just said,” he answered.

“How did you get here?” Adira asked.  The librarian began to smile at her.

“That’s an interesting story...one I have never told anyone willingly who did not already know.”  Adira waited patiently. He looked as if he would finally tell her something, something he wished to get off his chest.  She would listen gladly in that case.

The old Monsuta’s smile turned into a smirk.  “I won’t be telling you either,” he added, ready to see her annoyed response.  Adira was bemused rather than as frustrated as he thought she would be.

“Well, it’s your story to share.  What’s private is private if you don’t want to talk about it,” the paladin replied.  Talihah seemed taken aback by the response and turned his attention to the manuscript, spending the remainder of their time together explaining the Mark and nothing more.  When Adira left that evening, she realized he had not tried to annoy her once after that comment.

The next day, Adira was once again testing out her Mark 6 in the training grounds.  Her teachers looked at the girl working in the courtyard. The mecha swiped, shot, ran and flew almost perfectly.  While her training commenced, an unexpected but not unwelcome visitor entered the viewing area.

“Ah, Mr. Soen’na!” an older man exclaimed, “You came out of Thwayya, did you?  What can we do for you?”

The old Monsuta rested on the rail of the viewing area.  

“I‘m here to check on the Mark 6 and its pilot.  She been coming to Thwayya for the manuals,” he answered, focus on the palladin below.  When her training time finished, the viewers came onto the field. 

The teachers were expected.  The Monsuta slowly walking towards her was not.  

She greeted him, but he walked past her to reach the Mark 6.  Adira watched him investigate it bemusedly. 

“Hmm, it’s not a bad job,” he said when he finally straightened up, “But there’s a few problems.”

Problems he proceeded to point out in front of the small crowd, much to her ire.  Her teachers were glad he pointed them out.

“You really know about the M6!” an older man, Baldacci, praised.  Adira felt heat rising in her cheeks. Her teachers may be glad he was here to spout his superior knowledge but she was annoyed, embarrassed, and annoyed about being embarrassed.

Even so, when he left the Wushi training grounds to begin his slow walk to the library, Adira joined him.  She bought him a nice meal, which he almost refused to eat with her in the restaurant but her wheedling broke him down.  The next thing he knew he was sitting in a booth being stared at by surprise patrons and the knight in front of him alike.

After the meal, in which they had only had technical conversation about the Mark 6, Adira escorted him back to the library.  It may have been her imagination, but she thought she heard a muttered thanks.

It was a few days later when Adira returned to the library.  In far cry from her visit when she had originally trashed the Mark 6, the woman sought the Monsuta librarian out.

“Mr. Soen’na,” she approached him.  Talihah turned from where he had been organizing a shelf.

“Have I told you I despise formalities?” he asked her, “It’s just Talihah, starting today.”

Adira wondered if he really did despise formalities or if this was just his roundabout way of giving her first name privileges.  

“Alright Talihah,” she corrected, “I just wanted to inform you that I corrected all mistakes on the Mark 6 you pointed out and that the tests are going much better.”

“Fine,” the librarian said, lip twitching even as he faced the shelf once more.  Adira made no move to go. She counted a full two hundred eight seconds before the old man spun around.

“You informed me that your Mark 6 studies are done and good, so why are you still here?” he asked but his voice held more confusion than irritation.  The paladin smiled.

“I want to study up on all the Wushi ships.  It’ll take a long time, I'm sure, and I‘ll need someone who knows the information to guide me through and translate what’s in a dialect I can’t read,” Adira told him.  The news that she wanted to learn more caused his face to brighten before it was schooled to neutral once more.

“Well, you are hopelessly behind in your ship knowledge.  All pilots should have to learn about the Wushi ships, both past and present, their history, their makeup, detailed manuscripts.  If I was in charge…” 

Adira followed the ranting Monsuta towards the stairs that led to the section on ships, lips tugged into a grin the whole way.  His manner may leave something to be desired, but Talihah and his books were great teachers and Adira wanted to learn.

The paladin returned the next day and their lesson from the previous one continued.  After a few hours, both were silently reading. Talihah kept glancing curiously over at the knight.

“Have you fought in a real battle before?” he broke the silence.  Adira glanced up.

“No,” she answered, “And I hope not to.”

“You hope not to?  Why ever did you join this occupation then?” the librarian laughed.  

“I will fight if I have to, but I‘ll keep it as a last resort,” Adira answered the first question.

“So if a group of unknown enemies attacks your border right now, you’ll go talk first?” Talihah said skeptically.

“I will.  And if there is no other option and they’ve attacked first, I‘ll fight back so that others will be safe,” the knight responded.

“I can’t understand why you’re a paladin,” he scoffed, “You’re much too spineless.”

“I prefer to think I'm peaceful,” she refuted, “There are too many people in this city that can’t protect themselves.  I will help provide the peace in Vernda we need.”

“What inspired knighthood over other defensive occupations?” the librarian asked.

“My father was a founder of the Wushi Knights.  He valiantly fought back against threats, heading the fight in the Monsuta War, protecting Vernda for years.  I want to do the same,” Adira explained proudly.

“I don’t care to hear anymore,” Talihah interrupted, turning away.  Adira’s face fell, distressed.

“What?  Why wouldn’t you want Vernda protected?” she asked.  The initial response was to feel crestfallen, as though he had acted interested in talking, strung her along only to drop her.  Even after she had spoken, her thoughts had changed to those of suspicion, then to feeling insulted.

The librarian continued to face another direction, turning the pages of books.  

“I believe I said I was done with this,” he stated, tone and attitude distant.

The insulted feeling grew and she struck out in the irritation.

“You want the Monsuta to win,” she claimed.  Talihah’s face hardened. He looked ready to speak loudly but shut his mouth until it was nothing but a thin line.

“I don’t care who wins,” he said with blunt calm, “All I care for is that whoever wins let’s this library stay peaceful.  And that I stay in this library.”

The paladin was ready to snap again, but something, maybe his words, maybe his tone, stopped her.  

“Why would you be so aloof about this?  Your people and you don’t even care?” Adira pushed.  Talihah slammed the book from his hands to the table a few inches down.  He glared at her, then turned his head and muttered something under his breath before replying.

“I don’t even remember the Monsuta.  I was taken from them as a child seven decades ago!  How could I have any lingering loyalty, any attachments when I don’t remember them at all?” he answered her.

Talihah stood.  “We’re done here,” he said and walked away.  

The knight looked from his retreating back to the table.  The windows yellow light hit the book he’d thrown aside, another manual for the Marks.

The librarian had always struck her as bitter, presumably about the Monsuta’s loss.  Now, she realized he had no people and no home, other than this library. Raised by humans and spending seventy years with humans had probably changed him to be unrecognizable by his birth people.  His appearance was so obviously recognizable as a Monsuta that he rarely ventured outside and Adira considered that maybe he left so rarely because of how piercing every curious stare from the aliens surrounding him were.  He held one loyalty, to the one place that had served as his home and she now realized she could not blame the proverbial fish out of water for his apathetic attitude.

Every attempt he made to antagonize her, all the aloof words he said; Adira felt she could see past him.  And instead of irritation or confusion, she felt pity for the displaced librarian.

  
  


Her studies continued as though the conversation had never occured.  After two weeks, Talihah visited the Wushi training grounds and watched her pilot the Mark 6.  A young man scooted down the railing to give him room.

“Good to see you again, Mr. Soen’na.  I don’t know if you remember me from the last time you visited, but my name is Jiorna,” he introduced himself. 

Pleasantries were exchanged automatically, Talihah once more more focused on the piloting below than conversation above.

“She’s good,” Jiorna said after a while.  The librarian gave a soft grunt.

“She pilots the Mark 6 adequately.  Zahler knows the controls and the mecha very well now.  The Mark 6 itself is perfect, it’s only piloting skills in general holding her back,” he replied. 

“Still,” Talihah glanced over at the young man, “as you say, she’s good.”

Talihah joined Adira down below, where she was just being sent off by her superiors. He did not glance at the at the others, only focused on the paladin and the Mark behind her.

“Soen’na,” Baldacci greeted him, “anything else need to be fixed on the Mark 6?” 

“No,” the Monsuta shook his head, “she’s perfect.”

Adira escorted him back to Thwayya once more, stopping to treat him to a meal at a new restaurant.  It was, if possible, even more quiet than the last time but at least conversation was more varied than just Mark 6 specifics.  After the meal, Adira dropped the librarian off. Even as she made to leave, Talihah broke the silence.

“It was too long ago,” he sounded exhausted and was sitting down on the outside stairs, “I was too young to remember any details of how I was separated.  Too young to remember who I was separated from. But I heard details from others when I got older. The Wushi Knights had engaged in battle, but a few had been told to bring some Monsuta back.  Vernda didn’t know what the Monsuta were, where they came from, or if there needed to be any war at all. They didn’t want to genocide the unknown people either. So they brought me back, unable to subdue any adult in that instance.  That’s how I got here,” the librarian frowned, “That’s the story I‘m so unwilling to tell.”

Adira sat beside him on the stairway.  The answer came to a question she’d asked days ago, but it was welcome.

“Do you have anyone you care about?” the paladin asked gently.

“There were a few knights and a few scientists I liked. A few that pampered me.  Paoli, Everest, Zahler, Serenas, all dead now. And Kusoba Soen’na, the head librarian of Thwayya all those years ago, I really liked.  That’s why I‘m here, in Thwayya, specifically. Without Kusoba though, the library isn’t something- well, if I had a better option, I‘d take it. Other than them, there’s very few I want to spend time with anymore.”

“See?  You do care,” she half teased, poking his arm.  He pulled away but Adira had expected that. “And I‘m sorry Kusoba left you with no one.”

They looked out over the street quietly.

“Wait, Zahler?” Adira asked suddenly, “As in-”

“Yes,” he interrupted, “he was one of the knights that picked me up and continued to visit, even bringing his family.  You got the green eyes from him, by the way,” Talihah glanced over, “I may not remember many details, but I do remember seeing his and thinking they were the strangest eye color I‘d ever seen.”

“Huh,” she said intelligently.  They stayed silent a while longer.  The paladin swung her legs, working up the courage to say what she wanted to.  The sun's light faded and she knew she had to go.

“Thank you for sharing, Talihah,” Adira said standing, “I‘m glad you spend time with me,” she smiled,  “I‘m glad we’re friends.

“Hold up,” he grumbled, “don’t use that kind of language around me.  We’re close acquaintances.” She only laughed, saluting him goodbye and heading out in the darkness.

 

Adira continued to go to the library to study, sometimes being sent and sometimes, increasingly common, on her own accord.  An observant viewer could see that she often had something with her, half concealed. A box of snacks, a book shaped package, music disks.

More surprising, the hidden librarian of Thwayya came out of the shadows he’d spent  nearly seventy years shrouded in. Talihah’s one visit to Wushi became two and then three.  Soon they were weekly, all under the excuse of looking at the Mark 6 or investigating Wushi Knights forms and stances to make sure they matched his books.  That he only paid heed to one knight had many suspicious of those claims eventually. Wushi staff would smile at the softening librarian, behind his back of course.  No one would dare insinuate that he could be affectionate to his face.

The Mark 6 was performing admirably and Adira took it into the desert quite a few times for investigation.  Talihah would come to see her off from the viewing area and stay, talking quietly with the senior staff or the friendly Jiorna, waiting for her to return.

Then came the day the scouting stopped.  The day that all around Vernda, the announcement was spread; after decades of threat, Vernda is safe.  Travel would be open, it was declared, by the end of the year. The declaration was met with skepticism and/or excitement by all. 

Well, almost all.  Adira was currently wishing the announcement had never been made so her current headache could be avoided.

“I am only suggesting that we go for a short trek,” Talihah was telling her over a library table.  

“And I‘m really unsure about this whole thing,” the knight replied.  He paid her no heed.

“A quick walk, a quick picnic.  Is it not something one of those warm fuzzy stories of the past would tell of, something we have a chance to enjoy for the first time in either of our lives?” 

“It might not be safe.  And how exactly are we leaving?  Travel isn’t open yet,” Adira contested.

“Your own little system declared it safe for citizens, or will soon enough,” the Monsuta grumbled, “and I am a citizen.”

Adira glared at him.

“You’re going to bug me until I let up, aren’t you?” she deadpanned.  

“Ah, you know me so well,” Talihah responded.  The fight was won. Both the Monsuta’s description of the event and Adira’s hope to see his distant persona fade broke down the resistance to the outing.  

The next day, Talihah met a still reluctant Adira outside the Wushi Knight city exit.  They were both dressed in tan wraps, the clothes of the nomadic peoples when they used to travel in the desert outside.  The Monsuta’s clothes hooded his horns and wrapped around his face, leaving his eyes exposed behind the glasses both adventurers wore.  Armor was visible under Adira’s near white scarves. She also carried a backpack, one Talihah made no offer to help carry. In fact, he handed his small pack to her to carry, which Adira accepted with an eye roll.

Talihah couldn’t help but let out an unheard gasp when he stepped out of the bright doorway.  He had seen the desert in pictures and from between thick panes overlooking the Wushi training grounds.  This was the first time since he was too young to even remember well that he had stood outside Vernda. Winds blew lightly across the dunes, carrying sand in swirls.  In the distance small outcroppings of rocks were visible. 

He took the first steps of their little outing.  

“For nothing but sand and rocks, it’s impressive isn’t it?” the paladin asked softly behind him.  

The both of them headed out across the dunes.  After an hour of climbing dunes, they reached a hilltop that gave them a better view of the cold desert.  It stretched flatly on below for thousands of miles. Towards the side, however, were large rock outcroppings.  As they had no plans to travel across the flat wilderness, the two moved to the sand stained red rocks. As Adira climbed the assorted stones, she spotted an enclave.  The librarian behind her was straining, the trek itself an exertion and the crawling on rocks something unpracticed by the man. A break in this enclave was needed for him.

The motives for heading down were simply to get out of the cold wind and grating dust.  The simple action was a turning point neither had any warning for. 

“Shall we eat?” Talihah asked his younger companion.  She smiled. Even if the man acted either apathetic or purposefully aggravating, or both, Adira was set on cracking that exterior.  Even with the aloof attitude, the companionship over a meal was evidence he enjoyed what was undeniably a friendship.

The knight pulled the backpack off and moved to unwrap it to get to the food when a noise startled her.  The little canyon curved around, and Adira moved slowly to the corner to glance down the gully. There, yellow sunlight glinting off horns and carapace, was the second Monsuta the human woman had ever seen.  It was standing unmoving down the ravine, staring at the canyon side. Scraps of dirty cloth hung off its body uselessly. 

“Is that-” Talihah whispered by her side.  His scarves had been pulled aside his face to eat and Adira could his wide eyes and open mouth.

The figure down in the canyon moved disjointedly back from the wall.  He or she looked different from the short librarian Adira knew. The Monsuta was skinny, skinny enough to see bones where the endoskeleton was.  The carapace areas hung on the starved body uncomfortably. A Wushi knights trained eyes took in every detail they could. The long arms ending in thick, long, bony fingers and claws.  The hunch of the Monsuta’s back. As the figure’s head moved losely side to side as if the rock ravine side had something interesting to offer it, both Adira and Talihah were able to observe the unfocused yellow eyes.  

“Something’s wrong with him,” the librarian said.  Adira had come to the same conclusion. It was acting strangely.  And the eyes had seemed so blank that seeing them had been one of the most disturbing sights Adira could remember.  

“Hey!”  
Adira startled out of her thoughts, head whipping to the side to look at Talihah after his cry.  Her companion was stepping forward, looking intently at the unknown. The gaze he sent it, then the pleading one sent to her a moment later was the most intent she’d ever seen him.  The distant attitude had dropped, but under a circumstance Adira had never expected. 

“Wait, Talihah,” she reached for his arm.  The librarian she knew would have shrugged away.  The Monsuta didn’t even react to her hand holding him in place gently.  “You right that something is wrong. We should be careful.”

“We should be helping!” he retorted, a glimpse of the familiar persona shining through briefly before fading into something else. “Please child, help him,” the librarian pleaded, “we can rescue him.”

“I know,” she replied slowly, “and we will, but let me think a moment about how to approach.”  Adira glanced quickly to the side at the other Monsuta. It’s head lulled back, but the eyes no longer seemed unfocused.  It’s gaze on them caused the palladin’s stomach to roll uneasily. Her hand released the arm reluctantly.

“Hey,” Talihah called again, softer, “It’s alright.  We’re not enemies.”

He lifted both hands and showed them.  It occured to Adira that such a motion might not be a natural sign of non-aggression for Monsuta.  Talihah walked down the loose rocks uneasily, eyes glancing from the Monsuta to the unstable ground beneath him.

“We’re here to help,” Talihah spoke while moving forward.  It appeared to be watching, although who could say if it was listening to a word he said.  Adira’s already icy insides pitched forward in dread of something, the feeling of foreboding overtaking her for a moment.  

And then, as the librarian glanced down once more to look at the wobbling rocks he was moving down, the Monsuta struck.  It pounced soundlessly on Talihah, knocking the old librarian over. He fell with a yell, and his world became terror; claws on his arms, bony knuckles knocking his face to the side, strong legs pinning weak ones too strongly for them to do anything but instinctively make weak kicks.  And then the body was off his and he rolled on his side gasping. 

Adira had acted the moment Talihah had been pinned down.  She had leapt down the small incline, kneeing the assailant’s head.  A satisfying crack sounded as her armor made contact. Her hand sped to a cylinder attached to her waist.  It extended into a staff, then blades extended at the top. The knight lived up to her title, hitting and stabbing with fury.  Soon, she stepped back. 

The body wasn’t moving.  To both their continued shock, the corpse blackened.  And, in front of their eyes, burned into the ground. The stone beneath it glowed, melting deeply before begin to darken.  

The paladin knelt down by Talihah.  He had pushed himself into a sitting position, looking wide eyed at where the corpse had burned into the ground.

“That was not a Monsuta,” he spoke, “that was not one of my kind.  That was-that wasn’t-” Adira’s fight had been impressive, her form in battle moving even smoother than that of the Mark 6 under her piloting skills.  Her part in protecting him was instrumental. But he had never been in danger, never seen danger in person. Nor, he thought ironically, had he seen his kind outside of book illustrations.  

“That wasn’t a Monsuta,” Talihah repeated, voice cracking.

“I know,” Adira comforted, pulling the old librarian to face her instead of the burns, “I know.  And I'll warn, we’ll warn, everyone at Vernda about this- this  _ akuma. _ ”

_ ‘Akuma _ ,’ mouthed Talihah silently, translating from an old tongue of the humans.  Monster. Demon. His eyes returned to the violent darkened rock. His memories returned to the first violence he had ever witnessed.  It was, he decided, a fitting title.

The Wushi Knight led the way back, keeping Talihah close.  Both companions were anxious that they would be attacked by more combusting creatures.  Returning was decidedly harder. Not only was the old librarian covered in bruises and possibly broken skin, it was difficult to tell under all the wraps, he had spent too many days out of the many years at the library  _ in _ the library.  The Monsuta did not have endurance for long walks.  Add to the physical difficulties the mental convulsions of the akuma, questions on what it was, what it meant, and the violence felt and witnessed  _ and _ the stimulation of the outside desert after decades in a city; it was too much.

Talihah was walking too slowly.  The paladin stopped her pace. 

“Do you know what it means?” he asked her, “Our name?”

The Monsuta did not wait for a reply very long.

“Monster.  That’s what your ancestors named us.  And now I have to wonder, is a name I thought driven simply by fear of the unknown actually accurate?” continued Talihah.

“No, Talihah.  No, we already covered this.  That akuma back there was no Monsuta,” she answered him with sad eyes, before adding in a different tone, “Besides, 100% of the Monsuta I know are sentient, capable of just as much kindness and caring as humans are, and more intelligent than most humans I know.”

The librarian snorted.

“And 100% of the Monsuta you know are also old, male librarians.  You need to widen your pool of individuals before generalizing,” he said and her smile revealed that the retort was more than welcome.  

The escort back to Vernda eventually ended.  The bright spherical city was a welcome sight.  Both stumbled back through the door. Both were approached by questioning glances and people preparing to speak.  Adira beat them to it.

She summoned as many Wushi Knights as she could.  

“We thought it was safe out there.  That the Monsuta were no longer a threat so we could open our borders once more.  That is only partially true. The Monsuta are no threat, but the outside world is not safe,” Adira began.  She told them of the creatures. Talihah watched from the corner of the briefing room. 

Without more details, the threat was dismissed and discussion shelfed.  From his corner, the librarian sighed. Adira escorted him out after being dismissed.  

“It’ll take a sighting to get them convinced, but I‘ll be training for this mutation,” she promised.

  
  


As Adira predicted, it did take a sighting.  One morning, a young watchman named Herb Taylor saw a shape as he looked outside over the desert.  His sandwich was set aside on the bench besides the binocular stand. Both hands steadied the binoculars and cleared the image.  Standing some distance away was a still figure. Taylor snapped pictures and sent them to every superior who would be interested.  After a few hours, the solitary unmoving figure slipped down a dune and out of sight. 

The picture the watchman had taken was now displayed above a table in a windowless room.

“It does appear to be a Monsuta,” one official said.

“Well it isn’t,” a different voice cut in.  

“Mr. Soen’na, I don’t see how you could tell by this grainy of an image,” the first man replied.  Talihah scoffed, leaning on the table and looking away from the official. He had been asked to join the conference since he not only had a wide span of knowledge on the Monsuta from his time at the library, but _was_ _one_ as well.  Across the table, a woman pointed at the screen.

“I concur with Soen’na,” she said, “to a trained eye, there are multiple differences.  The arms are longer, the bodies skinnier, carapaces wider, horns curving instead of straight, and coloring more yellow than any Monsuta we’ve seen.  The problem is both what this is and what it means to us.”

The room was full of muttering and different hypothesis were sent up on individual screens. 

“It’s something that branched off the Monsuta,” the woman spoke up again, “of that there’s no doubt.  There is a relation.”

Talihah had been looking over the theories.  He glanced over the table again.

“I would be more concerned at the combusting the body can do,” said Talihah, “maybe it’s a disease, maybe a mutation, which is what my bet is on, but that combustion is what will cause the most damage.”

“You believe it’s a mutation?  Hmm, we haven’t seen the Monsuta in many years.  It’s quite possible they have had an unexpected mutation over those years of absence.  The combustion described by Wushi Knight Zahler and yourself does sound dangerous but without seeing it ourselves we have no guesses as to it’s cause so no way to counteract it,” one official mused.  Another asked, “Details are what we need. On the burning, on their genes, on their name.”

“They have a name,” Talihah told him, “They’re Akuma.”

The discussion yielded a few points of interest, but none that made progress in finding a way to defend against the creatures.  Talihah returned to the library at Thwayya and the officials parted to go their separate ways. They saw the picture as an interesting topic.  He saw it as confirmation of the attack he’d experienced recently.

Yet they seemed to be in the right.  The threat never emerged. The desert continued to be silent, still, quiet.  And the librarian and knight felt only foreboding at the peace.

  
  


One day, beneath the surface, shapes ran through the tunnels known to those in Vernda as the Underground.  One day, monsters threw themselves bodily at walls until they burned hot and seared through. One day, saxons blared throughout the Wushi Knight grounds.

Vernda’s defenses had failed.

The breach was luckily beneath the wall by the Wushi headquarters Adira was stationed at.  She and other paladins heard the alarms and rushed to prepare. Pilot armor went on over undersuits, knights climbed into their Marks, systems were connected.  Standing as ready as they could, wall peeled in on itself and the outside air blew over a dozen Marks standing set for battle.

The news took slightly longer to reach inward.  At the library of Thwayya, Talihah dropped the books he’d been organizing.  He rushed to the now familiar Wushi headquarters, up the stairs to the viewing area.  Gasping, leaning against the rail for support, he saw the fight in the desert below. There were twelve Marks out there.  Eleven lay in various forms of burnt uselessness on darkened sand. The once white Mark 6 remained standing, swinging slowly at the crowd of rabid akuma, barely visible through the kicked-up dust.

In tense terror, the Monsuta watched Adira alone struggle.  The battle was failing, that he and the other distressed watchers could tell.  The paladin swiped smaller akuma that had crawled on top her off the mecha. She swung the spear, knocking several back hard enough that they burned through the sand beneath them until neither they or sand remained.  Her shots fired loud enough to hear muffled in the viewing area. 

Talihah clenched the rail hard enough his hands strained.  The pain went unnoticed. All focus was on Adira’s second wind.  She moved through the waves powerfully. 

“She’s-she mastered it,” officer Baldacci breathed.  Vernda’s defense relied on the paladin keeping the wall unattacked.

“With all the time she got sent to the library, all the information I shoved in her brain and all the time she worked on her own...she’d better have,” Talihah muttered back, eyes glued on the scene.  Most of the akuma had been skillfully dispatched. 

The remaining monsters gave up their attack on the wall.  With singular focus each one leapt onto the Mark 6 and began to glow.  Through the dust, the mark could be seen dropping to one knee. Talihah did not wait to see more.

The librarian pushed himself from the rail and charged down the stairs once more.  Instead of leaving the grounds to head to the library as those above had assumed, he ran for the city exit.  Talihah reached for the door handle but a young man slid in front of it.

“Mr. Soen’na, it’s too dangerous out there,” Jiorna exclaimed.  The friendly young knight had not been one of the eleven pilots to die out there and Talihah felt some relief at that.  But he had no time to humor the man.

“Move,” Talihah responded roughly.

“I‘m sorry but please stay back,” the younger man said, “it isn’t safe for civilians out there.  Heck, it isn’t safe for knigh-”

“She’s my friend!” the older man pushed Jiorna aside.  He pawed the controls and moved passed the shocked knight into the windy desert.  Immediately upon getting outside, Talihah ran as best he could to the fallen Mark 6.  The other marks lay in burnt pieces, their smoke obscuring the city wall behind him. Through that dust and smoke he found Adira’s mark and crawled on top the dirt and cooled rubble.  Gloved hands pushed aside the sand covering the cockpit and went to work opening the cover.

“Adira!  Adira!” Talihah called down, “you did great.  You fought them all off, you defended Vernda like your father, like you dreamed to.  I‘m sorry I ever scoffed about that dream or about you.” He pushed a pane of the cockpit aside.  “Look how you done!” the Monsuta grabbed a handle and began to tug. “You protected this city, you protected me.  Adira, my friend, congratu-” 

His desperate optimism seeped away coldly when he opened the cockpit.  It was empty. The cockpit was lit by sunlight streaming through both the door he had opened and a gaping hole in the side he had not seen before.  The wind had moved the sand many times over, moving the ground and filling the cockpit, and Talihah realized there was no way to tell if there had been footprints leading out the hole or if she was buried under more debris and sand.  No way to tell if she was living or dead without equipment to pull apart the Mark 6 wreckage. He did not have that equipment. Nor did he have the will to find a corpse.

The old Monsuta stood off the debris and departed into the desert.  There may have been cries to stop or the sounds of a clean up crew, but the wind distorted sounds.  It did not matter. There was nothing in Vernda to return to. No wish in his heart to walk through the library he’d spent almost seventy years inside of.  No loyalty to the city, no conviction to stay. He’d hooked on the thought of finding Adira out here in the desert, that she had unexplainably having travelled outwards instead of back inside.  

Talihah had pulled his coat apart, hooding his head from the flying sand.  His hand tried to shield his eyes, but it shook and his muscles ached. Over the hours he’d fallen multiple times, but still would not head back.  Now, though, he had no way of telling which direction was back if he did wish to return. Through the grit he saw rock formations and stumbled towards them.  There were arches, gullies, caves. Talihah slipped forward into one such caved area. He fell against the rock, looking back over the sand blowing from the entrance he’d come from.

“ _ Arizaun _ !”

The librarian startled up from his position at the words.  He had translated them quickly, the dialect one seen in a few library books on the Monsuta and what language the humans had been able to pick up.  Sure enough, a glance deeper into the cave showed a small child with stubby horns and blue carapace. 

Talihah stumbled to his feet.  Just as he had to Jiorna earlier, he pushed past the child to look beyond her into the gully she’d come from.  Yes, they were skinny but not to the degree of the akuma. Yes, they spoke a language he could understand very little of.  But there was no doubt; they were Monsuta. Not the mutated akuma that had possibly killed Adira, but the species he belonged to yet had never seen.  

It had been the librarian’s guess that the mutation had wiped the unknown species out.  This tribe was either one of many or the last. Either way, he was pleasantly surprised to see his guess was wrong.  

What would Adira say? he wondered at the sight of the tribe below.  Another question immediately followed the first and he shook his head at it.  Would he ever be able to hear what she would say? A third disparaging question followed.  

Would he ever be able to stop wondering those two questions at every little discovery he made or action he took?

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The authors would like to thank you for your time!


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